


Lessons in Springtime

by Nope



Category: Books of Magic, Harry Potter - Fandom, Hellblazer
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-02-02
Updated: 2006-02-02
Packaged: 2018-11-05 13:16:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11014212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nope/pseuds/Nope
Summary: Harry accidentally blasts himself into another universe.





	Lessons in Springtime

"This," said John, lighting a cigarette behind cupped hands, "is a map of reality."

"No, it isn't," said Harry, sprawled out on his back on a park bench. "It's a tree."

"He's got a point," said Tim, sat on the grass at Harry's feet, absently crumbling the last of his sub into crumbs for the birds.

"Me or him?" asked Harry, and they both grinned and said "Yes" at the same time.

Hyde Park, mid-morning: the mage, the Merlin and the Chosen One, dappled in sunlight and soft broken shade.

"It's a bloody metaphor, alright?" said John. "You sure you're not the same bloke?"

"Yes," said Tim and Harry together again and lazily high fived.

John sighed, rubbing at his forehead. "I hate the both of you."

"No, you don't," said Tim. "He's right, though." This to Harry. "Sort of. You can think of time like a tree, where you're the trunk and the branches are all the possible outcomes of where you are. See, there's really only one way things can be the way they are, because they are, right? But there's thousands of ways things can be. Get it?"

"Not really, no," Harry said. "And where do the roots fit in?"

Tim considered this, then shrugged. "Yeah, on second thoughts, I'm going with the 'it's a tree' answer."

"Every branch is a different path, every leaf a different world, but they all come from the same source, right?" said John. "Our magics are all different--"

Tim cut in with, "John's a street-wizard. A whole lot of hokum and just a touch of pocus."

Harry chuckled.

"Fuck you and the falcon you flew in on," said John.

"He also has the mystical power of swearing a lot."

"Tim's the Opener," John said, pointedly ignoring that. "High magic and all that crap."

"I open doors," said Tim. "That's how we'll send you home. Close them too, though that's harder. I opened the door to Magic. I thought other people were doing it at the time, of course, but it was just me. Making myself a conduit. A vessel, for the song of the universe. Like all the other Merlins before me."

"You're Merlin?" said Harry, twisting sideways to look at Tim. "What, like, Arthur and all that?"

"And all that," agreed John. "It's just a name for a pattern."

"A Cambellian monomyth," said Tim. "The same old story, told anew. We're all archetypes, you know. The magician, the trickster."

"And I was born magic," said Harry, lying back. "What does that make me?"

"A Nietzchean genemage," said Tim loftily. "A genetic quirk that allows you to alter reality, empowering words and ritual; literal will to power--"

"Hark at college boy," said John. "Point is, we all come by it a different way, yeah, but it's all really the same old thing. The words, the wand, they're just what works for you. You ever do magic without them?"

"When I was younger I made the glass on a snake cage vanish. And my hair grow back when it was cut off. But, I mean, not deliberately. They just sort of happened. I didn't do any real magic till I got to Hogwarts."

"The first bit of magic I ever did," said Tim, grinning, "was turn a yo-yo into an owl."

"You did? Why?"

"To see if I could, mostly," said Tim.

"And you?" Harry asked John. "What did you do?"

"Summoned a demon," said John, shortly. "Look, the first thing you have to learn is--"

"--cleaning spells for your glasses," Tim broke in. "Binding charm to keep them on and unbroken. Trust me, there's nothing more embarrassing than trying to face down the forces of darkness when you can't see anything through the scratches, smudges and fingerprints on your lenses."

Harry smiled. "Hermione charmed mine for me. For Quidditch first, but I got hexed proper one DA meeting because I had to stop to push them up my nose, so now all the time."

John muttered something unintelligible and quite obscene under his breath. "Okay, the second thing you have to learn, then, that okay with you, your Merlinship?"

"Perfectly fine, my man," said Tim. He dodged John's idle kick.

"Learn what magic isn't," said John. "It's not good or evil, anathema or panacea, it just is."

"Like a wand," said Harry. "I mean, a wand is just a nifty looking stick until you do something with it."

Tim nodded. "But it's not exactly a tool. Or, rather, it is, but it's one that really, really wants to be used."

"The ultimate secret of magic," said John, "is any old cunt could do it."

"And they do," Tim added. "Everything is magic." He waved a hand at the world around them. "The water. The tree. The sunlight. Sitting in the park. Feeding the pigeons."

"Swearing a lot?" asked Harry.

"Even that," said Tim.

"But you can't just live it," John said. "That's not being a magician. You have to choose it." He took a last drag on his cigarette, dropped the butt, rubbed it out under his heel, exhaling smoke. "Do you believe in magic, boy?"

"I blasted myself into an alternate dimension while destroying a locket containing a piece of the soul of a man who came back from the dead looking quite a lot like a snake," Harry said, shading his eyes with an arm and staring incredulously at John. "I'm pretty sure magic is real."

"Yeah," said John, "but do you believe in it?"

Harry sat up. He looked around the park. The grass waved in the soft breeze. A couple jogged past, laughing and panting. Pigeons squabbled over crumbs. Distant horns beeped. Far above them a plane glinted, small and silver in the blue sky. The sun shone. Life continued.

"Yeah," Harry said. "Yes. I believe."

"And that's all you need," said Tim, quietly.

"...okay," said Harry, "but can it come with my own army?"

John grinned. "We'll make a proper magician of you yet, Harry Potter."


End file.
